It's kind of strange how people here don't seem to mind that they're doing a new version of the original Space Battleship Yamato, but seem to object to a new version of the original Macross.

That might be partly due to the original Yamato series fell off a cliff after the second series - everything after that was getting worse and worse (with the exception of the final scene in the revised Final Yamato of course...)

Macross has been consistantly good (I don't like M7 but others certainly love it, same thing in reverse for Frontier). Of course I'd be happy to see a Macross Remake, if it's great then that is great, if it stinks then I can ignore it.

It should probably be noted that Yamato 2199 isn't set to premiere in theaters till April 7, 2012, with the first DVD/Blu-ray's street date being May 25th. It's not gonna be on TV till 2013. The preview that a few members have seen has been just that, a 50 minute-preview (TV episodes 1 & 2 combined together) that's been making it's way around select theaters in Japan. This is why no one has seen it outside of those attending the previews.

No, I don't think so. Macross the First is more than good enough. I would like for them to do other stuff and bring new ideas--like a hipster meltran and her zentran brother that's an idol otaku decide to runaway from home because their parents want them to join the military; and instead, they go to the Macross 33 aka Williamsburg and start a indie band called Yak! Deculture. Unfortunately for them, their flatmate is a straightlace pilot who's in love with the classics "minmay, firebomber and sharon apple" and can't stand this "new sound." He doesn't see any "culture" in it.

It should probably be noted that Yamato 2199 isn't set to premiere in theaters till April 7, 2012, with the first DVD/Blu-ray's street date being May 25th. It's not gonna be on TV till 2013. The preview that a few members have seen has been just that, a 50 minute-preview (TV episodes 1 & 2 combined together) that's been making it's way around select theaters in Japan. This is why no one has seen it outside of those attending the previews.

Small correction- those that have seen it were only treated to episode 1 at a special Launch Ceremony. No theatrical screenings start until April 7. Keep an eye on starblazers.com for my full report soon. :-)

To the OP yes I would like a remake but try not to change the story around too much.

The footage in that pachinko game was nice. Maybe make all the battles as exciting as modern animes and give it close to movie quality smoothness.

DYRL is still a movie within SDF and the story in that is not a remake since in that retelling minmay had never met hikaru before she was famous. DYRL was more of a retelling of the story in a different way. I would hope a remake just keeps the canon story of SDF (where they had no space carriers to attach to the ship yet) but upgrade the visuals and redo battlescenes.

Keep the old mech designs (maybe make the vf-1 a little rounder like the VF-0) and leave the characters alone though. Maybe they could merge macross zero with SDFM so that we get to see global civil war that was going on before the arrival of the ship which brought peace. (animate this a little and also show us some anti-un fights?)

It would not be like a george lucas thing (new cg effects added of objects that were never really there before) but more like Lord of the Rings' upgraded gollum seen in "the two towers".

I'd happily go for a remake. But REMAKE, not a freaking reboot. The original SDFM story was awesome, to the point that it touched "serious" things in a way very few anime back then did, and it still stands on its own. The animation, on the other hand, lacked the technical beautifulness to really transmit the sheer awesomeness of valkyrie & space warfare most of the times.

Even if it's an OVA, as long as it keeps the original story mostly intact, and bridges the current gaps between M0 & SDFM, I'll be a happy camper

I would hope a remake just keeps the canon story of SDF (where they had no space carriers to attach to the ship yet) but upgrade the visuals and redo battlescenes.

Minor quibble. They DID have space carriers to attach to the ship.They're attempting to rendes... rendez... randay... MEET UP WITH and dock with ARMD-1 and ARMD-2 before the fold accident. The Zentradi shift their attack to make it impossible to meet up with them. Then Global attempts to duck into the atmosphere and fold behind the moon to get some breathing room, and everything goes REALLY wrong.

Keep the old mech designs (maybe make the vf-1 a little rounder like the VF-0)

You should man, really... IS A-W-E-S-O-M-E. I recommend you watch the original Yamato and the original Gundam movies afterwards. The original SDF Macross took a lot from them. Kawamori was a Yamato/Gundam fan and got inspired by those shows to create Macross...

BTW... I'm telling you people... the next Macross TV series should be an animated MACROSS THE FIRST...

Don't be afraid of remakes... Astroboy, Cyborg 009 and many other series have been remade several times over the years. That's what made those franchises last, the remakes.

What if the original series is remade but is expanded into several seasons with new related stories? What if some characters from Zero were added (engineer Nakajima, Edgar Lasalle, Mao Nome, etc)? What about episodes describing what happened during the 2 years interval after episode 27? More focus on destroid pilots? Macross Space War I timeline is so epic there is plenty of room for stories set in that era...

New alternate and expanded stories and new animation can make them better.

it would be like gundam with far more sprituality and more like the floating rocks thing from macross zero with more weirdness but action like gundam or star wars but with proper guided missiles and stuff.

This show could be brought to International audience because it would not use the macross name but be a macross-like show with "new-agey hippie" themes in it like Star Wars or Gundam. There would be a lot darker tone to this other show and more mystery like the original macross at the beginning where we were terrified of the aliens and they were more like giant monsters.

The fact is SK has some interesting ideas but the mystical stuff is obviously pissing off the scifi mecha show guys. I liked the theme of macross zero and the end of the world prophecy ideas in it but I don't think many liked the floating rocks and move away from the sci-fi and into sci-fantasy. If he can reboot macross into a new show that can be brought to international audience I would like that. I liked macross plus a lot despite it originally not being part of the macross series.

All he has to do is take all his mystical ideas and throw them into a new macross-like show. (like his version of robotech lol with people with psychic powers, telekinetic powers, prophetic visions that allow pilots to avoid death through spiritual awakened powers etc combined with macross-like tranforming mechas. The pilots are the more evolved people that break the limits of the human brain through training but they would still need skills like normal pilots without psychic abilities and sensitivity to alien entities from other dimensions who take control over thier bodies to guide them.)

If max jenius was ripped out of macross but given new type abilities and fought demonic aliens then that'd be the show. The zentradi originally refer to themselves as "satan's dolls" and the show would take a much more literal take on that: the aliens are demon-like and are not represented as just the evil intentions of ordinary men but a physical thing that can be killed with mecha or robots that have been posessed by demonic force that turns on humans (ie the sdf1 going out of control in macross plus due to AI thinking it was god and playing around with the minds of humans through mind control as the more highly evolved being)

There would be no pacifist ideas in the show but it would be more about taking responsibility for feeding the demons thier energy which they would harvest and use against the humans by exploiting their spiritual weaknesses.We created them from our own minds they came into reality through our ability to create, and we are destined to fight against them to correct ourselves. (think of it like the humans in the movie "terminator" where the tech surpasses the creators and the creators must undo the mistakes of the past to solve the problems they themselves created. Obviously the terminator represents Herod trying to kill the messiah, sarah conner is Mary giving birth to the messiah, and the human resistance is the humans preventing satan from assassinating their savior)

In the future, machines would have real souls and humans would ride the mecha like the way you might ride a horse (not literally) where the beast becomes more attuned to you and understands your intentions and pilots could concentrate on aiming their weapons while the mechas act on orders of the pilots. They experience emotions and stuff and can think out of the box like a human with original ideas and a personality. They are mechanical, but there is a spirit inside it and can lose focus, make mistakes, make bad predictions and break its rules to learn like a human.

The humans invested a lot of money experimenting in the development of super soldier type mechas with demonically enhanced powers which causes them to go crazy and seek to control its creators as the beings that escaped from their ancient prison are now free to possess all the minds of the weapons and create their own zombie-like army of soldier mechs. All the negative emotions of hate, fear, greed, jealousy, pride etc causes these entities to become more powerful and recruit more humans to their cause as they corrupt the nature of the world they now inhabit. (think of it like the one ring of Lord Of The Rings where friends turn against each other at the amusement of these evil demons that feed off our negative energy and physical/fleshly/worldly insecurity)

Like gundam the only solution is when people finally stop fighting against each other and working towards peace to rid themselves of the demons they created. All the technology like in Battlestar Galactica would be semi useful (manual guided weapons) since pilots would not benefit much from automated systems which do not detect these beings. Pilots' own psychic powers would be needed to make accurate attacks. Their brains and heightened awareness would be like the "radar" for being able to hunt these things down. (just like "The Force" is used in star wars to detect the movements of your opponent to give the outward impression of fast reflexes and cat-like agility.)

You should man, really... IS A-W-E-S-O-M-E. I recommend you watch the original Yamato and the original Gundam movies afterwards.

No thanks. Watched the original Gundam TV series years ago and it is really, really not for me. I really can't stomach the MS designs, the rational behind the MS, Minovski particles or the style of mecha combat.

No thanks. Watched the original Gundam TV series years ago and it is really, really not for me. I really can't stomach the MS designs, the rational behind the MS, Minovski particles or the style of mecha combat.

Or the angst!

Graham

MS Gundam (UC series) is mostly science fiction. Macross is pure space fantasy.The rationale behind the Mobile Suits is certainly more realistic than that of building giant transformable airplanes to fight giant sized aliens. You'd think outer space had an atmosphere watching Macross.As for the characters, well lets say I'd take an Amuro Ray, Bright Noa and Sayla Mass every day of the week before even considering whinny little Hikaru Ichijo, Misa Hayase and bitchy Linn Minmei.

MS Gundam (UC series) is mostly science fiction. Macross is pure space fantasy.The rationale behind the Mobile Suits is certainly more realistic than that of building giant transformable airplanes to fight giant sized aliens. You'd think outer space had an atmosphere watching Macross.As for the characters, well lets say I'd take an Amuro Ray, Bright Noa and Sayla Mass every day of the week before even considering whinny little Hikaru Ichijo, Misa Hayase and bitchy Linn Minmei.

No thanks. Watched the original Gundam TV series years ago and it is really, really not for me. I really can't stomach the MS designs, the rational behind the MS, Minovski particles or the style of mecha combat.

Or the angst!

Graham

You made the mistake of watching the TV series instead of the more concise and tightly written movies trilogy. The movies are better animated and are more canon to the fandom and UC continuity. Some of the best animated robot action scenes ever are in those movies (right next to Gunbuster and DYRL IMHO).

The angst isn't that bad in all of the 1980's Gundam titles. IMHO the angst factor starts to get annoying with Victory. And gets worse after Evangelion.

Never try to rationalize anime reality. Macross had tons of faults too.

What I would like kawamori to do is keep macross a sci fi show with mecha and physical aliens.

Then make a whole new mecha show about the shadow people: .....................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................

Though, I appreciate your enthusiasm I fell asleep into the 3rd paragraph.

Perhaps writing in point form might work better?

_________________________________________

I would be keen on the idea of re-animating the show with existing VA, but unfortunately that would only bring in a modest amount of new fans. I have no issues with remaking the series and adding a few episodes to flesh out some parts, but my fear is the temptation to "Lucasize" the show!

Yes Kawamori played with magic and fantasy in M7, but he's admitted that he's over that now. Personally, I would like to see "The First" given anime treatment or even a team of fresh writers given a crack at the original outlines that became Macross 30 years ago.

It would also give Kawamori the opportunity to clean up some of the discrepancies between SDFM and the current universe. Things like the use of the VF-0 in flashbacks within SDFM as opposed to the necessity of making the fighter a dirty little "secret" of the UNG. Greater elaboration on how MIllia and Max fell for each other, <place you SDFM plot peeve here>.

Though with any remake the danger always exists that egos believe they can fix what was never broken...

No no no... Really, you should give the movies a try. They remove lots of useless stuff that was in the TV series and they have way better animation. The mecha action in them is epic...

The Gundam movies are another example of a remake done right... Maybe the original Macross TV series could be remade in a movie serial format.

Completely disagree. I watched all three of them on the big screen and I absolutely hated them. In fact I talked about the agony I endured on one of the MW podcasts we did a while back. Seriously, my head was pounding. I begged for mercy but all I got was relentless punishment.

No no no... Really, you should give the movies a try. They remove lots of useless stuff that was in the TV series and they have way better animation. The mecha action in them is epic...

The Gundam movies are another example of a remake done right... Maybe the original Macross TV series could be remade in a movie serial format.

Absolutely. The original Gundam tv series was cut short because it was a failure in terms of tv ratings. Tomino never really managed to flesh out the concept of newtype in Gundam. So the whole tv series amounts to a monster of the week type thing plus some disconnected mention of newtype here and there. But you as the viewer never really come away with the reason of WHY newtypes are important. Their role for the future of humanity etc..The films as Kronnang Dunn has said are way better. The authors basically re-editied the tv series, adding new animation, throwing a lot of crap away and finaly focusing everything around the newtype concept. That is the reason the films are so superior to the tv series. So much so that they are considered cannon and not the tv series by Tomino. If you have to watch one or the other by all means watch the films. You'll get the whole Gundam experience without the bad parts.

Now since Macross more or less has the same number of episodes as Gundam, and it has its fair share of filler episodes doing a re-edit of the story and putting it on film is not an impossible task. I mean you can reduce Macross to 7 hours of tightly paced action and story without changeing the nature of the series. And no DYRL is not a solution. That film was a "what if" type of scenario. It is not a re-edit of Macross (notwithstanding what Kawamori has said, will say now, or in 20 years when he changes again his stance on the subject).